


take up your well-shaped oar

by xahra99



Series: Odyssey [7]
Category: Black Sails
Genre: Domestic Bliss, Domestic Fluff, M/M, Post-Canon, Post-Prison, Reunited and It Feels So Good
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-02
Updated: 2018-04-02
Packaged: 2019-04-17 13:08:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,960
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14189631
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/xahra99/pseuds/xahra99
Summary: 1716. “They told me men who enter these gates never leave,” says James. “I took it as a challenge.”Flint and Thomas escape from prison with the help of a friend. Post-series. Complete.Part seven of an eight-part series





	take up your well-shaped oar

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, so here it is, the fic series nobody asked for for a programme that finished last year because I like to watch entire series on Amazon rather than waiting for each episode to come out. Part seven of eight Black Sails character studies/missing scenes. Flint is still hard to write, Abigail is still awesome, and Thomas is a much better character than I have room for here. The prison inspector idea is based upon an actual prison break by Frank Abagnale (the real con-man behind the Leo DiCaprio vehicle Catch Me If You Can), and Savannah, Georgia, still didn't actually exist during this time period (it was founded in 1733). Also, the title quote is a massive innuendo. However, this fic has no warnings. There may be mention of sex. Once. if you squint.  
> The title quotes are from the Odyssey, from both Emily Wilson's and the Penguin translation because I'm a massive geek.

“Take up your well-shaped oar and journey on, until you come where there are men who know nothing of the sea.” -The Odyssey.

 

Flint sets them both free with the help of some friends.

 

Flint: “Odysseus, on his journey home to Ithaca, was visited by a ghost. The ghost tells him that once he reaches his home, once he slays all his enemies and sets his house in order, he must do one last thing before he can rest. The ghost tells him to pick up an oar and walk inland, and keep walking, until somebody mistakes that oar for a shovel. For that would be the place where no man had ever been troubled by the sea, and that’s where he’d find peace.”

 

_Savannah, 1716_

 

“I’m going to get us out of here,” James says.

It’s the second thing he tells Thomas, after _I love you_ but before _everything’s going to be all right_.

Thomas just smiles and clasps him tighter. James clings to him like a drowning man to a spar, terrified that none of this is real. Perhaps Thomas will vanish like smoke from the boilers and his hands will close on empty air.

He closes his eyes and feels Thomas’s stubble scratch his cheek, the roughness of his cotton shirt beneath his fingers. The tilled earth shifts beneath his boots. 

“You’re here,” says Thomas. He curls one hand around the nape of James’s neck. The touch of his fingers makes James shiver. “It’s enough.”

James knows he should pull back, that their embrace will betray them, if it hasn’t already. He hasn’t come so far, endured so much, to lose Thomas now. He takes a deep breath of humid Georgia air and leans into Thomas for one last second before forcing himself to step away.

He is afraid he might see disappointment in Thomas’s eyes. Instead he sees understanding.

Someone taps him on the shoulder. James plants his feet in the dirt and swings round. The guard standing behind him hesitates at the look in his eyes.

“Come on,” he tells James.  “I’ll show you to your quarters. Work starts at dawn.”

James looks back, not at the guard but at Thomas, who nods. “Go,” he says quietly. “We have waited ten years. We can wait a little longer.”

James hesitates.

“I’ll see you later,” Thomas promises, and James goes, recalling for the moment that he is a prisoner, and no pirate captain.

The guard leads him away, past the men working in the fields. James sees a few women fetching water and even a scattering of children hand-weeding the plants laboriously. He wonders what crime they committed to be sent here. Adultery, sodomy, debt-or perhaps they are here for no reason other than someone thousands of miles deciding that they needed to. His frown deepens.

The guard beside him says something. James doesn’t hear him the first time-he’s thinking too deeply, so the guard must repeat himself. In some plantations James has known the repetition would be punctuated by a lash, but it seems that the Savannah estate is not most plantations.

“You seem to be well acquainted with Thomas Hamilton.”

“We were good friends in England,” James says. He expects the guard to make some jibing comment, but he just nods, gaze sliding quickly away. James wonders what rumours the man has heard about them all.  There has always been a certain element of theatre in the Hamilton affair-infidelity, scandal, suggestions of madness. Visitors from Nassau, of all places. The name of Long John Silver. Perhaps this guard has not heard the gossip. Perhaps Lord Hamilton was so effective in suppressing any hint of scandal that their secrets followed him to his watery grave.

They pass a row of ruined cabins, once sturdily brick-built with a single door and window and a tower at each end in the style of a stable. A massive swamp chestnut has collapsed on the roof, shattering the wall, and throwing bricks in all directions until the once-neat row of cabins resembles the hull of a wrecked ship. James wonders if the inhabitants escaped, though from the look of all the damage there’s not much chance they could have survived. 

“Storm,” his guard says laconically, jerking his head towards the wreckage.  He points to the edge of the field, to another row of cabins in the shade of an alley of oaks. Even from this distance, the buildings look flimsy. James counts over twenty small abodes, each more ramshackle than the last, “End one’s yours.  As you can see, we’re short on space.  You can kip with Hamilton.”

James nods. He would sleep on the bare ground if it means he could be beside Thomas again.

“I’ll leave you to it,” says the guard. “Go on.”

Flint walks down the oak-lined path to the last of the cabins. Swags of moss drip from every branch and daub the cabins’ faded white paint. He brushes moss from his shoulder as he steps onto the porch, ducking beneath a row of hanging laundry.  The boards creak beneath his weight. He pushes open the door, feeling like he’s intruding. There’s about as much space inside as there is beneath the veranda outside. There is no furniture, just a pallet on the floor. A wooden chest, a washboard, a few pots and pans. A grate and a brick-lined fireplace. There is nothing in the room that speaks to him of Thomas.

James goes out, closing the door quickly behind him, and waits on the porch for Thomas to return from the fields.

It takes far too long, though the look Thomas gives him as he comes up the path could last him for another seven years of exile. Somehow, though, it’s not enough. He could spend every waking moment with Thomas the rest of his life and it would never be enough.

They embrace beneath the shade of the veranda before Thomas draws him inside. There is no chair, so they sit beside each other on the pallet. Thomas stares at James as though he does not believe that he is here. James knows that feeling all too well. He raises one hand slowly and brushes Thomas’s cheek. 

It’s a shame that the first thing out of Thomas’s mouth is the last thing James wants to hear. “How is Miranda?”

James swallows. “Miranda’s dead.”

Thomas leans forwards and takes a long shuddering breath. “What happened?”

James opens his mouth, but Thomas holds up his hand. He presses a rough finger to James’s lips. “No,” he says, voice hoarse. “Wait. There will be time for that later. Just-just be here. Here. Now. That’s all I ask.”

James would give Thomas anything he asked for. Silence is simple. He nods, and Thomas pulls him closer.

They do not weep. Instead they mourn, foreheads pressed together, in a tangle of limbs, seeking reassurance in the closeness of bodies, in choked sobs, fast breaths, shared grief. James inhales the smell of mildewed blankets, sweat, starched linen, dark earth, and something else that is uniquely Thomas, something he had nearly forgotten in all those years apart.

“I remember the first time we met,” says Thomas later. It is full dark by now, and insects sing a trilling chorus into the dusk. “She was like a diamond. Brilliant, and not afraid to show it.”

“She was that,” James agrees, and counters Thomas’s reminiscence with one of his own, and they swap tales long into the night.

James wakes the next morning to the clanging of the work bell, and new resolve. They have mourned the past together. Now he must prepare for their future.

He is James McGraw again.

But he is also Captain Flint, and no cage can hold him for long.

***

He waits until midday to put the first part of his plan into practice.  The prisoners are fed their lunchtime meal in the fields so as not to break their work. The guards bring out a cart with a few pails of cornbread and dried herrings and jugs of water. James hangs back, collecting up the jugs, and helps the guards load them back onto the cart. He bumps elbows with the guard who showed him to the cabin. “I’m sorry.”

The guard just shrugs, as if a prisoner’s apology means nothing.

“What’s your name?” James asks.

“Wilmot,” The guard lifts three jugs in each hand and swings them up onto the cart. “But don’t go getting familiar.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” James says. “May I speak to you a moment? In private?

The guard-Wilmot-gives James an odd look, but he nods. “No funny business, though. And you can say what you’ve got to say right here.”

James lowers his voice. “You understand that you can reveal to nobody what I’m about to say.”

The guard stares at him suspiciously. He glances around at his companions, who are paying the pair of them no attention. Then he nods.

“I’m not what I appear.” James pauses to give the soldier time to digest this information. “I’m sure you had suspected this already. You’re a perceptive man.”

Wilmot frowns. James can almost see the mill of the guard’s thoughts grinding the news exceeding small. “What’s going on?”

James nods at Thomas. “This has to do with Lord Hamilton.”

The guard’s forehead furrows. “What’s so special about Hamilton?”

“That’s not for me to tell you,” James says, because if he starts listing all Thomas’s abilities then he will never stop. “Look, do you know Mr. Mackey?” When the guard shakes his head Flint presses “Mr. Simpson? Mr Brett?”

Wilmot frowns and shakes his head again. The weapons at his belt chime together; a good sword and a middling-type pistol. James draws closer; close enough to wrest the pistol from Wilmot’s belt, clap it to his head and threaten him unless he strikes off all their chains, but he knows that such a gambit is unlikely to reap any lasting reward and he resists temptation. “Then you won’t have been privy to my mission. Take me to the governor. It’s time I told him what I know.”

“The governor’s a busy man.”

“He will have time,” James says with confidence, as if the mere idea of the governor refusing to see James McGraw, a prisoner, is inconceivable. Despite his confidence, he is by no means certain of success, so it’s a relief when Wilmot leads him away from the fields and takes him around the back of the plantation mansion.

Oglethorpe’s mansion is modelled on the Palladian style, with Grecian pillars, wide shuttered windows and all the other trappings of Old England that sit so strangely on Colonial soil. The back is less impressive. James waits for a moment outside in the warm sunlight outside the servant’s door. Bees hum among the bricks, and through the wide windows drifts the rhythmic knocking sound of somebody sweeping the floor. The air smells of tilled earth and flowers. An air of warm domesticity pervades the place. He is as far from the Caribbean and the sooty streets of London as any man might hope to be.

Wilmot interrupts his reverie. “Come on.”

James follows him inside the house. The interior is cool and shadowy, lit only by thin beams of sunlight lancing through the shutters. James peers into the rooms as he passes. The house is sparsely furnished despite its lavish exterior. The spartan decoration is normal in the Colonies, where any goods of quality must be shipped from England at great expense and no little trouble.

The guard leads him into a small room with that looks out onto the fields. Mr Oglethorpe, the plantation governor, sits at his desk. Flint has done as much research as possible before his arrival and he knows Oglethorpe for a kind man, predisposed to see the best in people and well suited to managing a plantation composed almost entirely of troublesome aristocratic prisoners. He does not rise as they walk in.

 “What is the meaning-?”

James holds out his hand. still dirty from the fields. “Congratulations,” he says, lengthening his vowels until the accent that emerges from his mouth is not the one that he was born with.

“Your pardon, sir.” Oglethorpe frowns at James’s extended palm. He does not take it. “I was told you must consult me on a matter of some import. What is it?”

James withdraws his hand and wipes it on his breeches. He sinks into the chair opposite Oglethorpe, crosses his legs and slides down until he is lounging aristocratically. He regards Oglethorpe through half-closed eyes. “It’s as I said. Congratulations, sir. I must admit I did expect to wait a little longer. Commend your men.”

Surprise crosses Oglethorpe’s face. “I shall. What is your business, sir?”  

James half-turns to regard the soldier at his back with narrow eyes. “I must speak with you alone.”

“I hardly think that wise.”

James shrugs. “So, your man stays. It’s your decision.”

Oglethorpe’s mouth tightens. He looks over James’s head at the guard. “Leave us now.”

Wilmot nods and withdraws. James drags his chair a little closer, leans forwards and plants his elbows on Oglethorpe’s desk. “Your men will have informed you of my close acquaintance with Lord Hamilton.”

“They have,” agrees Oglethorpe. “Now what is this about?”

“We were schoolfriends together in England,” James says in that accent that makes no mention of what county its speaker was born in, but rather what school he attended. “Now his family has sent me to assure that he is being treated fairly and report to them of the conditions in which Lord Hamilton is being held. There are rumours- “

Oglethorpe bristles, as much as any man can bristle in a powdered wig. Sweat rolls down his forehead. “I can assure you that Lord Hamilton has been treated here with every kindness!”

“So I have seen,” James assures him. “You may be sure I shall make mention in my report of your most assiduous care. I think it only fair that I provide you with due warning in return.”

“What warning?”

“This place shall soon receive a visitor. A close friend of the Hamilton family. She will expect to visit with Lord Hamilton to examine his conditions and your care. If she decides that he has been rehabilitated sufficiently, she may expect to secure his release.”

“When?”

“Less than a week.” James shrugs. “I expected to pass unmasked much longer. You should commend your men for their attention.”

Oglethorpe nods as if he is half-convinced already. “I will need proof.”

“She will provide my documents. Make good use of your time.” He raises one eyebrow and grants Oglethorpe a glare that has convinced a hundred merchants to offer up their cargo without raising a sword in return. “I’m giving you this chance to set your house in order. Understand?”

Oglethorpe lifts a pen and spins it in his fingers. “You understand that I shall still have to work you in the fields. That is the purpose of this place. Redeeming Christian souls through hard labour.”

James nods. From what little he knows of the plantation, Oglethorpe’s idea of hard labour is nothing compared to a ship at sea, which must be crewed around the clock in any weather. “I would expect no less.”

“I’m glad you understand.”

“Of course,” James says. “Your job cannot be easy.”

Oglethorpe shrugs. “No man’s life is.”

“Thank you, sir. I’ll take my leave.” James pushes back his chair, scanning the documents on Oglethorpe’s desk as he does so. He sees nothing of importance, merely bills of fare, invoices, and the business of running a plantation. Nothing that could be an obstacle.

“Thank you,” Oglethorpe says. “A moment with my man?”

“I’ll send him in,” James says. He leaves and waits outside the door. Georgia is humid in summer and sweat runs down beneath his shirt. He runs a hand over his head and feels stubble pricking against his fingers. He thinks he’ll let his hair grow back.

He leans against the sun-warmed bricks and thinks of nothing as he waits for the soldier to arrive. It’s been so long since he had the luxury of doing nothing, even for a moment. This is his life now. It seems too fantastic for him to comprehend. He reminds himself that this plantation is merely a station on their journey home. Where is home? It’s not Nassau. Nor London. They will have to find somewhere together that they can call their own.

A voice breaks his reverie. “So, you’re a spy?”

James looks up and sees Wilmot. A young man, squarely built, with a colonial accent. A native. He has no idea what Oglethorpe has said to the man, but from the grin on the guard’s face their conversation has gone well. “Merely a friend of the Hamilton family.”

“I knew that you were different from the start,” asserts the guard confidently.

“You’re a perceptive man,” replies James. He is careful not to say too much, so that the man’s own mind will fill his pauses with whatever he most wants to hear.

“Thought you’d get one over on us eh? Goes to show that us Colonial crew aren’t as provincial as you thought.”

“I suppose not.”

The guard taps him on the shoulder. “Spy or no, the cane can’t wait. Back to work.”

They return to the farm. James is assigned to a different field, and so he does not see Thomas until much later the same evening, when the work is done and the sun sinking behind the clouds is gold as a Spanish doubloon.

This time, it is Thomas who greets him on the porch. He has washed his face and hands and changed into a clean shirt; the old one, James sees, is soaking in a bucket near the door. He looks up as James approaches and greets him with the same slow disbelieving smile.

It isn’t until they are sharing the same small ration of cornbread that Thomas asks, “Why are you really here?”

 “I told you,” James says. “I’ve come to set you free.”

Thomas laughs. The sound comes slowly at first, as if he is not used to it, and then he breaks into a guffaw. In other circumstances, James might feel offended.

“Don’t you believe me?”

“I do believe that you could conquer all the world if you set your mind to it.”

James shakes his head. “My ambition does not reach so far. Not anymore.”

Thomas’s grin widens even further. “From the look of things today, you seem to have matters well in hand. Very well. I shall sit back and suffer myself to be rescued.”

“They told me men who enter these gates never leave,” says James. “I took it as a challenge.”

“But how? This place is a plantation. It’s no prize to be boarded.” He grins. “See, even we poor prisoners have heard of the terrible Captain Flint.”

“Do you recall Lord Ashe’s daughter?”

Thomas nods. “An intelligent young lady.”

“She means to change the world.”

 “Good fortune to her.” Thomas smiles ruefully. “I hope she does better at it than us poor sinners.”

“She has grown into a young woman of uncommon intelligence and determination. I was fortunate enough to meet her in Savannah, where I enlisted her help. I shall not trouble you with the details. Suffice it to say that I expect to be rescued very shortly. The governor here is convinced I am an agent.”

“An agent? Of whom?”

“Does it matter?”

“I suppose not. Now, come. We’ve spoken of Miranda. Now tell me what happened when you both left London. I want to hear it all.”

James obliges. Thomas is a good listener. He takes it all in without much comment. Occasionally he reaches over and squeezes James’s hand, or interjects with some comment upon tactics. After the third such interruption James says, “You would have made a better pirate captain.”

“Impossible. You seem to have made quite a name for yourself. The dread Captain Flint. The sort of man who would board three prizes before breakfast, wash his hands, carry off some sweet fair lady and say to her ‘Damn this quiet life. I want work!’”

James smiles despite himself. “It was not quite that way.”

“As you have told me,” Thomas says more soberly.

“Captain Flint is dead,” James says. “John Silver slew him on Skeleton Island. Let him rest. When pirates go down in the books as the monsters in children’s stories, then Flint will be a name to frighten children by the fireside. Nothing more.”

They speak of nothing consequential for the rest of the night, and in the morning, they head to the fields. For James, just knowing that they have the prospect of escape is enough. Every time his hoe digs into the soil, he thinks of Odysseus. Thomas works beside him with vigour.  James finds the work pleasant, but he knows that Abigail cannot wait forever. At midmorning he takes off his shirt and hangs it from a fencepost, and by mid-afternoon Wilmot comes down to the fields and calls them over. “Gentlemen?”

Many of the workers look up. The guard points to Thomas, then to James. “You have a visitor.”

They exchange glances, set aside their tools, and leave the field behind. Wilmot takes them to the house. He leads them round a row of cypress trees and in through the porticoed front door. A carriage waits outside. The horses are still harnessed, as if their owner does not expect to wait for long.

The guard leads them down a hall and into the drawing room. Abigail sits at a low table with Oglethorpe’s wife and daughters, taking tea.

Oglethorpe rises, gesturing to them. “These are the men.”

Abigail rises smoothly and offers Thomas her hand. “Lord Hamilton,” she says, nodding at James. “Mr McGraw.”

“Miss Ashe,” Thomas takes Abigail’s hand and kisses it. “I am charmed.”

James mutters “My Lady.”

“You know these men?” demands Oglethorpe.

“Yes, of course.” Abigail smooths her skirts and seats herself. “Do you know why I am here?”

There are two spare seats at the table. Thomas takes the first with the confidence of someone born to privilege and gestures Flint into the second. “I have some inkling.”

“Your family sent me here,” confirms Abigail. She looks Thomas up and down, eyes lingering on the dirt staining his clothes, his work-roughened hands. “You look like you have been well treated. Is this true?”

Thomas nods. “I have. Mr Oglethorpe and his family have accommodated every reasonable request.”

Abigail takes a small journal from the pocket of her skirt and makes a note in it. “Mr McGraw? Do you have any more to report?

 “No, my lady.” James shakes his head. “All appears to be in order.”

“You’ll find all as Mr McGraw says,” Oglethorpe confirms. “If I could trouble you for his documents?”

“Of course.” Abigail pulls a sheaf of papers from the pocket of her mantua.  “I’ll think you’ll find that everything is in order here.” She unfolds the papers to an elaborate document confirming the identity of one James McGraw. The signature is especially flourishing. James frowns at the documents, hoping that whoever Abigail found to forge the document has curtailed his more artistic tendencies.  But the paper passes muster, in Oglethorpe’s opinion at least. All traces of suspicion have vanished from his face, as if Abigail’s appearance has confirmed for him that everything Flint told him is the truth. He flicks through the rest of the papers and pauses. “My lady Ashe? Is this correct?”

Abigail nods. “Absolutely.”

“Miss Ashe?” Thomas asks her gently.

“I have here a letter from my father,” she says. “Signed with his seal and deposited with his lawyer before his death. The latter instructs Mr Oglethorpe that following my father’s death Lord Hamilton-yourself-is to be released into the custody of his representative. As my father’s sole remaining heir, that duty falls to me.” She glances at Oglethorpe. “Is everything correct?”

Oglethorpe nods. “It all appears to be in order. With all due respect, madam, there is but one small thing. The matter of Lord Hamilton’s annuity.”

“The sum paid by my father for Lord Hamilton’s board,” Abigail says as if she understands him perfectly.

“A sum not paid for several years,” Oglethorpe corrects. “And not so small.”

Abigail smiles sweetly up at Oglethorpe. She reaches into her mantua and pulls out a bill of exchange. “The amount of the annuity was listed in my father’s accounts. I apologize for his oversight, and trust this shall suffice.”

Oglethorpe peers at the bill. His brow smooths. “My thanks,” he says, nodding at the three of them. “Safe travels to you all.”

Abigail rises from her chair. She inclines her head to Oglethorpe’s family, who nod and smile back. Then she leads them, sweeping queenly as a figurehead, down the hallway and down the flight of shallow steps that lead to the long drive in from of the house. They step up into the carriage. Abigail calls to the driver, who whips the horses. The carriage rattles down the dirt road, past the fields on either side, past the prisoners who remain. The gate with the wreathed motto of Georgia closes behind them.

And just like that, they are free.

They take the carriage north and halt at a coaching house in the humid heat of noon. Abigail descends from the carriage and beckons them after her. At the back of the inn two horses are tied to a hitching post, a chestnut and a black. Saddles rest beside them on a rail with saddlebags stuffed full of supplies. Abigail walks over to the rail and strokes the chestnut’s nose. 

“These are horses and provisions,” she says, indicating the bags. “Fresh clothes. I hope I have supplied everything that you will need. I’m sorry that I can’t do more.”

“You have done more than enough,” says Thomas. He leans over and sweeps Abigail up in an impulsive hug. She looks surprised for a moment, then clings to him.

“This seems a way to ensure that we all prosper.” she says into his shoulder. “For me to repay something of the debt my father owed you both. For the damage that he did.”

James and Thomas exchange a glance across her back. “We owe you a debt we can never repay.” says James. “I hope there will be no consequences.”

Abigail pulls away. “I leave today for Philadelphia. I shall not see this place again. I am not concerned with consequences.”

“All the same, Miss Ashe,” Thomas says. He inclines his head. “Live well.”

Abigail wipes her eyes. She nods at them both, sets her jaw and turn back towards the carriage. James and Thomas watch her go.

They spend the night together in a patch of scrubland by the river outside the town. It is the best night’s sleep that James has had in years. He wakes to the smell of frying bacon and to a kiss pressed to his shoulder. Kindness still seems strange to him, though he supposes he will become used to it in time. 

The horses shift and whicker as Thomas scrapes their plates. James picks out their feet and saddles them up, one by one; Thomas’s chestnut gelding and James’s black mare. The horses remind him of the Spanish mare he left behind in Nassau. Wherever that beast is, he hopes someone treats her well. He takes a last look round the campfire as Thomas fills their canteens from the river.

“To us,” he says, toasting James with a flask of water. James has seen him toast with fine glassware many times in London clubs, but here in Georgia by the river the gesture looks completely absurd. “Let us begin anew. Announce our partnership to the winds.” He hands James a canteen. “My name is Thomas Hamilton. And I am in love with James McGraw.”

James toasts him back. He takes a long drink of water, then smiles and shakes his head. “To us,” he confirms. “And now, we must be gone.” 

“Where to?” Thomas swings astride his horse. “Some safe harbour?”

“No harbour is completely safe,” James says as he boards the black. She swings away and cow-kicks Thomas’s gelding.  He taps her with his heel and she subsides with a huff.

Thomas smiles. “Do you think I don’t know that? Somewhere far from here. We’ll find a way. A home. Some hidden Ithaca.”

James sniffs the wind. A sharp easterly breeze is rolling in from the sea, laden with moisture and promising rain. “Let’s go west.”

“Why west?”

“I’ve heard that in the west there are few men and many wonders. Let’s go inland and find a place where no man has ever seen the sea.” He is sure that Thomas will recognize the reference. “Like in the poet’s tale.”

Thomas winks. “Take up your well-shaped oar, eh?”

“You are ridiculous.” James tells him. “As for our destination, I leave it up to you.”

“Do you have no opinion?” Thomas says thoughtfully. His chestnut takes advantage of his lapse and sidles off into the brush, snatching at all the tall grass he can find before Thomas remembers him and pulls him back. “I doubt that very much.”

James shrugs. “I led myself to believe that I would never see you again.” he says as their horses fall in beside one another. “I resolved to sail for Nassau and finish what we started. And then I made up my mind to watch the world burn. I never thought anything would come after.”

Thomas smiles and takes his hand. “My love,” he says. “What comes next is our future.”

***

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Why not check out some of my other finely-crafted fics? Next up: Woodes Rogers gets his just deserts, and this series comes to an end.


End file.
